NBC | Wikipedia audio article

The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is
an American English-language commercial broadcast television network that is a flagship property
of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. The network is headquartered at 30 Rockefeller
Plaza in New York City, with additional major offices near Los Angeles (at 10 Universal
City Plaza), Chicago (at the NBC Tower) and Philadelphia (at the Comcast Technology Center).
The network is one of the Big Three television networks. NBC is sometimes referred to as
the “Peacock Network”, in reference to its stylized peacock logo, introduced in 1956
to promote the company’s innovations in early color broadcasting. It became the network’s
official emblem in 1979. NBC has thirteen owned-and-operated stations
and nearly 200 affiliates throughout the United States and its territories, some of which
are also available in Canada via pay-television providers or in border areas over-the-air;
NBC also maintains brand licensing agreements for international channels in South Korea
and Germany.==History==Founded in 1926 by the Radio Corporation of
America (RCA), NBC is the oldest major broadcast network in the United States. At that time
the parent company of RCA was General Electric (GE). In 1930, GE was forced to sell the companies
as a result of antitrust charges. In 1986, control of NBC passed back to General
Electric (GE) through its $6.4 billion purchase of RCA. (GE later liquidated RCA but kept
NBC.) Following the acquisition by GE, Bob Wright served as chief executive officer of
NBC, remaining in that position until his retirement in 2007, when he was succeeded
by Jeff Zucker. In 2003, French media company Vivendi merged
its entertainment assets with GE, forming NBC Universal. Comcast purchased a controlling
interest in the company in 2011, and acquired General Electric’s remaining stake in 2013.
Following the Comcast merger, Zucker left NBCUniversal and was replaced as CEO by Comcast
executive Steve Burke.===Radio=======Earliest stations: WEAF and WJZ====
During a period of early broadcast business consolidation, radio manufacturer Radio Corporation
of America (RCA) acquired New York City radio station WEAF from American Telephone & Telegraph
(AT&T). Westinghouse, a shareholder in RCA, had a competing outlet in Newark, New Jersey
pioneer station WJZ (no relation to the radio and television station in Baltimore currently
using those call letters), which also served as the flagship for a loosely structured network.
This station was transferred from Westinghouse to RCA in 1923, and moved to New York City.WEAF
acted as a laboratory for AT&T’s manufacturing and supply outlet Western Electric, whose
products included transmitters and antennas. The Bell System, AT&T’s telephone utility,
was developing technologies to transmit voice- and music-grade audio over short and long
distances, using both wireless and wired methods. The 1922 creation of WEAF offered a research-and-development
center for those activities. WEAF maintained a regular schedule of radio programs, including
some of the first commercially sponsored programs, and was an immediate success. In an early
example of “chain” or “networking” broadcasting, the station linked with Outlet Company-owned
WJAR in Providence, Rhode Island; and with AT&T’s station in Washington, D.C., WCAP.
New parent RCA saw an advantage in sharing programming, and after getting a license for
radio station WRC in Washington, D.C., in 1923, attempted to transmit audio between
cities via low-quality telegraph lines. AT&T refused outside companies access to its high-quality
phone lines. The early effort fared poorly, since the uninsulated telegraph lines were
susceptible to atmospheric and other electrical interference.
In 1925, AT&T decided that WEAF and its embryonic network were incompatible with the company’s
primary goal of providing a telephone service. AT&T offered to sell the station to RCA in
a deal that included the right to lease AT&T’s phone lines for network transmission.====Red and Blue Networks====RCA spent $1 million to purchase WEAF and
Washington sister station WCAP, shut down the latter station, and merged its facilities
with surviving station WRC; in late 1926, it subsequently announced the creation of
a new division known as the National Broadcasting Company. The division’s ownership was split
among RCA (a majority partner at 50%), its founding corporate parent General Electric
(which owned 30%) and Westinghouse (which owned the remaining 20%). NBC officially started
broadcasting on November 15, 1926. WEAF and WJZ, the flagships of the two earlier
networks, were operated side-by-side for about a year as part of the new NBC. On January
1, 1927, NBC formally divided their respective marketing strategies: the “Red Network” offered
commercially sponsored entertainment and music programming; the “Blue Network” mostly carried
sustaining – or non-sponsored – broadcasts, especially news and cultural programs. Various
histories of NBC suggest the color designations for the two networks came from the color of
the pushpins NBC engineers used to designate affiliate stations of WEAF (red) and WJZ (blue),
or from the use of double-ended red and blue colored pencils. On April 5, 1927, NBC expanded to the West
Coast with the launch of the NBC Orange Network, also known as the Pacific Coast Network. This
was followed by the debut of the NBC Gold Network, also known as the Pacific Gold Network,
on October 18, 1931. The Orange Network carried Red Network programming, and the Gold Network
carried programming from the Blue Network. Initially, the Orange Network recreated Eastern
Red Network programming for West Coast stations at KPO in San Francisco. In 1936, the Orange
Network affiliate stations became part of the Red Network, and at the same time the
Gold Network became part of the Blue Network. In the 1930s, NBC also developed a network
for shortwave radio stations, called the NBC White Network.
In 1927, NBC moved its operations to 711 Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, occupying the upper floors
of a building designed by architect Floyd Brown. The space that NBC occupied was designed
by Raymond Hood, who based the appearance of its multiple studio facilities on “a Gothic
church, the Roman forum, a Louis XIV room and, in a space devoted to jazz, something
‘wildly futuristic, with plenty of color in bizarre designs.'” NBC outgrew the Fifth Avenue
facilities in 1933.In 1930, General Electric was charged with antitrust violations, resulting
in the company’s decision to divest itself of RCA. The newly separate company signed
leases to move its corporate headquarters into the new Rockefeller Center in 1931. John
D. Rockefeller, Jr., founder and financier of Rockefeller Center, arranged the deal with
GE chairman Owen D. Young and RCA president David Sarnoff. When it moved into the complex
in 1933, RCA became the lead tenant at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, known as the “RCA Building”
(later the GE Building, now the Comcast Building), which housed NBC’s production studios as well
as theaters for RCA-owned RKO Pictures.====Chimes====The iconic three-note NBC chimes came about
after several years of development. The three-note sequence, G-E’-C’, was first heard over Red
Network affiliate WSB in Atlanta, with a second inversion C-major triad as its outline. An
executive at NBC’s New York headquarters heard the WSB version of the notes during the networked
broadcast of a Georgia Tech football game and asked permission to use it on the national
network. NBC started to use the chimes sequence in 1931, and it eventually became the first
audio trademark to be accepted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.A variant sequence
with an additional note, G-E’-C’-G, known as “the fourth chime”, was used during significant
events of extreme urgency (including during World War II, especially in the wake of the
December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor; on D-Day and during disasters). The NBC chimes were
mechanized in 1932 by Rangertone founder Richard H. Ranger; their purpose was to send a low-level
signal of constant amplitude that would be heard by the various switching stations manned
by NBC and AT&T engineers, and to be used as a system cue for switching individual stations
between the Red and Blue network feeds. Contrary to popular legend, the G-E’-C’ notes were
not originally intended to reference to the General Electric Company (an early shareholder
in NBC’s founding parent RCA and whose Schenectady, New York radio station, WGY, was an early
affiliate of NBC Red). The three-note sequence remains in use by the NBC television network,
most notably incorporated into the John Williams-composed theme music used by NBC News, “The Mission”
(first composed in 1985 for NBC Nightly News).====New beginnings: The Blue Network becomes
ABC====In 1934, the Mutual Broadcasting System filed
a complaint to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), following the government
agency’s creation, claiming it ran into difficulties trying to establish new radio stations in
a market largely controlled by NBC and the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS). In 1938,
the FCC began a series of investigations into the monopolistic effects of network broadcasting.
A report published by the Commission in 1939 found that NBC’s two networks and its owned-and-operated
stations dominated audiences, affiliates and advertising in American radio; this led the
Commission to file an order to RCA to divest itself of either NBC Red or NBC Blue.
After Mutual’s appeals were rejected by the FCC, RCA filed its own appeal to overturn
the divestiture order. However, in 1941, the company decided to sell NBC Blue in the event
its appeal was denied. The Blue Network was formally named NBC Blue Network, Inc. and
NBC Red became NBC Red Network, Inc. for corporate purposes. Both networks formally divorced
their operations on January 8, 1942, with the Blue Network being referred to on-air
as either “Blue” or “Blue Network”, and Blue Network Company, Inc. serving as its official
corporate name. NBC Red, meanwhile, became known on-air as simply “NBC”. Investment firm
Dillon, Read & Co. placed a $7.5 million bid for NBC Blue, an offer that was rejected by
NBC executive Mark Woods and RCA president David Sarnoff.
After losing on final appeal before the U.S. Supreme Court in May 1943, RCA sold Blue Network
Company, Inc., for $8 million to the American Broadcasting System, a recently founded company
owned by Life Savers magnate Edward J. Noble. After the sale was completed on October 12,
1943, Noble acquired the rights to the Blue Network name, leases on landlines, the New
York studios, two-and-a-half radio stations (WJZ in Newark/New York City; KGO in San Francisco
and WENR in Chicago, which shared a frequency with Prairie Farmer station WLS); contracts
with actors; and agreements with around 60 affiliates. In turn, to comply with FCC radio
station ownership limits of the time, Noble sold off his existing New York City radio
station WMCA. Noble, who wanted a better name for the network, acquired the branding rights
to the “American Broadcasting Company” name from George B. Storer in 1944. The Blue Network
became ABC officially on June 15, 1945, after the sale was completed.====Defining radio’s golden age====NBC became home to many of the most popular
performers and programs on the air. Bing Crosby, Al Jolson, Jack Benny, Edgar Bergen, Bob Hope,
Fred Allen, and Burns and Allen called NBC home, as did Arturo Toscanini’s NBC Symphony
Orchestra, which the network helped him create. Other programs featured on the network included
Vic and Sade, Fibber McGee and Molly, The Great Gildersleeve (arguably broadcasting’s
first spin-off program, from Fibber McGee), One Man’s Family, Ma Perkins and Death Valley
Days. NBC stations were often the most powerful, and some occupied unique clear-channel national
frequencies, reaching hundreds or thousands of miles at night.
In the late 1940s, rival CBS gained ground by allowing radio stars to use their own production
companies to produce programs, which became a profitable move for much of its talent.
In the early years of radio, stars and programs commonly hopped between networks when their
short-term contracts expired. During 1948 and 1949, beginning with the nation’s top
radio star, Jack Benny, many NBC performers – including Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy,
Burns and Allen and Frank Sinatra – jumped to CBS.
In addition, NBC stars began migrating to television, including comedian Milton Berle,
whose Texaco Star Theater on the network became television’s first major hit. Conductor Arturo
Toscanini conducted the NBC Symphony Orchestra in ten television concerts on NBC between
1948 and 1952. The concerts were broadcast on both television and radio, in what perhaps
was the first such instance of simulcasting. Two of the concerts were historic firsts – the
first complete telecast of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, and the first complete telecast of
Verdi’s Aida (starring Herva Nelli and Richard Tucker), performed in concert rather than
with scenery and costumes. Aiming to keep classic radio alive as television
matured, and to challenge CBS’s Sunday night radio lineup, which featured much of the programs
and talent that had moved to that network following the defection of Jack Benny to CBS,
NBC launched The Big Show in November 1950. This 90-minute variety show updated radio’s
earliest musical variety style with sophisticated comedy and dramatic presentations. Featuring
stage legend Tallulah Bankhead as hostess, it lured prestigious entertainers, including
Fred Allen, Groucho Marx, Lauritz Melchior, Ethel Barrymore, Louis Armstrong, Ethel Merman,
Bob Hope, Danny Thomas, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. and Ella Fitzgerald. However, The Big
Show’s initial success did not last despite critical praise, as most of its potential
listeners were increasingly becoming television viewers. The show lasted two years, with NBC
losing around $1 million on the project (the network was only able to sell advertising
time during the middle half-hour of the program each week).
NBC’s last major radio programming push, beginning on June 12, 1955, was Monitor, a creation
of NBC President Sylvester “Pat” Weaver, who also created the innovative programs Today,
The Tonight Show and Home for the companion television network. Monitor was a continuous
all-weekend mixture of music, news, interviews and features, with a variety of hosts including
well-known television personalities Dave Garroway, Hugh Downs, Ed McMahon, Joe Garagiola and
Gene Rayburn. The potpourri show tried to keep vintage radio alive by featuring segments
from Jim and Marian Jordan (in character as Fibber McGee and Molly); Peg Lynch’s dialog
comedy Ethel and Albert (with Alan Bunce); and iconoclastic satirist Henry Morgan. Monitor
was a success for a number of years, but after the mid-1960s, local stations, especially
those in larger markets, were reluctant to break from their established formats to run
non-conforming network programming. One exception was Toscanini: The Man Behind the Legend,
a weekly series commemorating the great conductor’s NBC broadcasts and recordings which ran for
several years beginning in 1963. After Monitor ended its 20-year run on January 26, 1975,
little remained of NBC network radio beyond hourly newscasts and news features, and Sunday
morning religious program The Eternal Light.====Decline====
On June 18, 1975, NBC launched the NBC News and Information Service (NIS), which provided
up to 55 minutes of news per hour around the clock to local stations that wanted to adopt
an all-news radio format. NBC carried the service on WRC in Washington, and on its owned-and-operated
FM stations in New York City, Chicago and San Francisco. NIS attracted several dozen
subscribing stations, but by the fall of 1976, NBC determined that it could not project that
the service would ever become profitable and gave its affiliates six months’ notice that
it would be discontinued. NIS ended operations on May 29, 1977. In 1979, NBC launched The
Source, a modestly successful secondary network providing news and short features to FM rock
stations.The NBC Radio Network also pioneered personal advice call-in national talk radio
with a satellite-distributed evening talk show, TalkNet; the program featured Bruce
Williams (providing personal financial advice), Bernard Meltzer (personal and financial advice)
and Sally Jessy Raphael (personal and romantic advice). While never much of a ratings success,
TalkNet nonetheless helped further the national talk radio format. For affiliates, many of
them struggling AM stations, TalkNet helped fill evening time slots with free programming,
allowing the stations to sell local advertising in a dynamic format without the cost associated
with producing local programming. Some in the industry feared this trend would lead
to increasing control of radio content by networks and syndicators.
General Electric acquired RCA in 1986, and with it NBC, signaling the beginning of the
end of NBC Radio. Three factors led to the radio division’s demise: GE decided that radio
did not fit its strategy, while the radio division had not been profitable for many
years. In addition, FCC ownership rules at the time prevented companies acquiring broadcast
properties from owning both a radio and television division. In the summer of 1987, GE sold NBC
Radio’s network operations to Westwood One, and sold off the NBC-owned stations to various
buyers. By 1990, the NBC Radio Network as an independent programming service was pretty
much dissolved, becoming a brand name for content produced by Westwood One, and ultimately
by CBS Radio. The Mutual Broadcasting System, which Westwood One had acquired two years
earlier, met the same fate, and essentially merged with NBC Radio.
GE’s divestiture of NBC’s entire radio division was the first cannon shot of what would play
out in the national broadcast media, as each of the Big Three broadcast networks were soon
acquired by other corporate entities. NBC was a particularly noteworthy case in that
it was the first to be acquired – and was bought by a conglomerate outside the broadcast
industry as GE otherwise primarily served as a manufacturing company. Prior to the GE
acquisition, NBC operated its radio division partly out of tradition, and partly to meet
its then-FCC-mandated requirement to distribute programming for the public good (the broadcast
airwaves are owned by the public; as that broadcast spectrum is limited and only so
many broadcast stations existed, this served as the basis for government regulation requiring
broadcasters to provide certain content that meets the needs of the public). Syndicators
such as Westwood One were not subject to such rules as they did not own any stations. GE’s
divestiture of NBC Radio – known as “America’s First Network” – in many ways marked the
“beginning of the end” of the old era of regulated broadcasting and the ushering in of the new,
largely unregulated industry that is present today.
By the late 1990s, Westwood One was producing NBC Radio-branded newscasts on weekday mornings.
These were discontinued in 1999 (along with Mutual branded newscasts), and the few remaining
NBC Radio Network affiliates became affiliates of CNN Radio, carrying the Westwood-owned
service’s hourly newscasts 24 hours a day. In 2003, Westwood One began distributing NBC
News Radio, a new service featuring minute-long news updates read by television anchors and
reporters from NBC News and MSNBC, with content written by Westwood One employees.====Restoration====
On March 1, 2012, Dial Global announced that it would discontinue CNN Radio, and replace
it with an expansion of NBC News Radio on April 1, 2012. This marked the first time
since Westwood One’s purchase of NBC Radio and its properties that NBC would have a 24-hour
presence on radio. A previous program, First Light, placed new emphasis on the NBC brand
after diminishing it over the years. With the change, NBC News Radio expanded its offerings
from 60-second news updates airing only on weekdays to feature two hourly full-length
newscasts 24 hours a day. Subsequently, on September 4, 2012, Dial Global launched a
sports-talk radio service, NBC Sports Radio. NBC News Radio has been distributed by iHeartMedia
and its TTWN Networks since July 2016. It is provided to the network’s 24/7 News Source
affiliates and includes a top of the hour newscast along with other audio content which
is heard on over 1000 radio stations.===Television===For many years, NBC was closely identified
with David Sarnoff, who used it as a vehicle to sell consumer electronics. RCA and Sarnoff
had captured the spotlight by introducing all-electronic television to the public at
the 1939–40 New York World’s Fair, simultaneously initiating a regular schedule of programs
on the NBC-RCA television station in New York City. President Franklin D. Roosevelt appeared
at the fair before the NBC camera, becoming the first U.S. president to appear on television
on April 30, 1939 (an actual, off-the-monitor photograph of the FDR telecast is available
at the David Sarnoff Library). The broadcast was transmitted by NBC’s New York television
station W2XBS Channel 1 (later WNBC-TV; now WNBC, channel 4) and was seen by about 1,000
viewers within the station’s roughly 40-mile (64 km) coverage area from its transmitter
at the Empire State Building. The following day (May 1), four models of
RCA television sets went on sale to the general public in various department stores around
New York City, which were promoted in a series of splashy newspaper ads. DuMont Laboratories
(and others) had actually offered the first home sets in 1938 in anticipation of NBC’s
announced April 1939 television launch. Later in 1939, NBC took its cameras to professional
football and baseball games in the New York City area, establishing many “firsts” in television
broadcasting. Reportedly, the first NBC Television “network”
program was broadcast on January 12, 1940, when a play titled Meet The Wife was originated
at the W2XBS studios at Rockefeller Center and rebroadcast by W2XB/W2XAF (now WRGB) in
Schenectady, which received the New York station directly off-air from a tower atop a mountain
and relayed the live signal to the Capital District. About this time, occasional special
events were also broadcast in Philadelphia (over W3XE, later called WPTZ, now known as
KYW-TV) as well as Schenectady. The most ambitious NBC television “network” program of the pre-war
era was the telecast of the Republican National Convention held in Philadelphia in the summer
of 1940, which was fed live to the New York City and Schenectady stations. However, despite
major promotion by RCA, television sales in New York during 1939 and 1940 were disappointing,
primarily due to the high cost of the sets, and the lack of compelling regularly scheduled
programming. Most sets were sold to bars, hotels and other public places, where the
general public viewed special sports and news events. One special event was Franklin D.
Roosevelt’s second and final appearance on live television, when his speech at Madison
Square Garden on October 28, 1940, was telecast over W2XBS to receivers in the New York City
area. Television’s experimental period ended, as
the FCC allowed full-fledged commercial television broadcasts to begin on July 1, 1941. NBC station
W2XBS in New York City received the first commercial license, adopting the call letters
WNBT. The first official, paid television advertisement broadcast by any U.S. station
was for watch manufacturer Bulova, which aired that day, just before the start of a Brooklyn
Dodgers baseball telecast on WNBT. The ad consisted of test pattern, featuring the newly
assigned WNBT call letters, which was modified to resemble a clock – complete with functioning
hands – with the Bulova logo (featuring the phrase “Bulova Watch Time”) in the lower
right-hand quadrant of the test pattern (a photograph of the NBC camera setting up the
test pattern-advertisement for that ad can be seen at this page). Among the programs
that aired during the first week of WNBT’s new, commercial schedule was The Sunoco News,
a simulcast of the Sun Oil-sponsored NBC Radio program anchored by Lowell Thomas; amateur
boxing at Jamaica Arena; the Eastern Clay Courts tennis championships; programming from
the USO; the spelling bee-type game show Words on the Wing; a few feature films; and a one-time-only,
test broadcast of the game show Truth or Consequences, sponsored by Lever Brothers.Prior to the first
commercial television broadcasts and paid advertisements on WNBT, non-paid television
advertising existed on an experimental basis dating back to 1930. NBC’s earliest non-paid
television commercials may have been those seen during the first Major League Baseball
game ever telecast, between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Cincinnati Reds, on August 26, 1939 over
W2XBS. In order to secure the rights to televise the game, NBC allowed each of the Dodgers’
regular radio sponsors at the time to have one commercial during the telecast. The ads
were conducted by Dodgers announcer Red Barber: for Ivory Soap, he held up a bar of the product;
for Mobilgas he put on a filling station attendant’s cap while giving his spiel; and for Wheaties
he poured a bowl of the product, added milk and bananas, and took a big spoonful. Limited,
commercial programming continued until the U.S. entered World War II. Telecasts were
curtailed in the early years of the war, then expanded as NBC began to prepare for full-time
service upon the end of the war. Even before the war concluded, a few programs were sent
from New York City to affiliated stations in Philadelphia (WPTZ) and Albany/Schenectady
(WRGB) on a regular weekly schedule beginning in 1944, the first of which is generally considered
to be the pioneering special interest/documentary show The Voice of Firestone Televues, a television
offshoot of The Voice of Firestone, a mainstay on NBC radio since 1928, which was transmitted
from New York City to Philadelphia and Schenectady on a regular, weekly basis beginning on April
10, 1944. The series is considered to be the NBC television network’s first regularly scheduled
program. On V-E Day, May 8, 1945, WNBT broadcast several
hours of news coverage, and remotes from around New York City. This event was promoted in
advance by NBC with a direct-mail card sent to television set owners in the New York area.
At one point, a WNBT camera placed atop the marquee of the Hotel Astor panned the crowd
below celebrating the end of the war in Europe. The vivid coverage was a prelude to television’s
rapid growth after the war ended. The NBC television network grew from its initial
post-war lineup of four stations. The 1947 World Series featured two New York City area
teams (the Yankees and the Dodgers), and television sales boomed locally, since the games were
being telecast in the New York market. Additional stations along the East Coast and in the Midwest
were connected by coaxial cable through the late 1940s, and in September 1951 the first
transcontinental telecasts took place. The post-war 1940s and early 1950s brought
success for NBC in the new medium. Television’s first major star, Milton Berle, whose Texaco
Star Theatre began in June 1948, drew the first large audiences to NBC Television. Under
its innovative president, Sylvester “Pat” Weaver, the network launched Today and The
Tonight Show, which would bookend the broadcast day for over 50 years, and which still lead
their competitors. Weaver, who also launched the genre of periodic 90-minute network “spectaculars”,
network-produced motion pictures and the live 90-minute Sunday afternoon series Wide Wide
World, left the network in 1955 in a dispute with its chairman David Sarnoff, who subsequently
named his son Robert Sarnoff as president. In 1951, NBC commissioned Italian-American
composer Gian Carlo Menotti to compose the first opera ever written for television; Menotti
came up with Amahl and the Night Visitors, a 45-minute work for which he wrote both music
and libretto, about a disabled shepherd boy who meets the Three Wise Men and is miraculously
cured when he offers his crutch to the newborn Christ Child. It was such a stunning success
that it was repeated every year on NBC from 1951 to 1966, when a dispute between Menotti
and NBC ended the broadcasts. However, by 1978, Menotti and NBC had patched things up,
and an all-new production of the opera, filmed partly on location in the Middle East, was
telecast that year.====Color television====While rival CBS broadcast the first color
television programs in the United States, their system was incompatible with the millions
of black and white sets in use at the time. After a series of limited, incompatible color
broadcasts (mostly scheduled during the day), CBS abandoned the system and broadcasts. This
opened the door for the RCA compatible color system to be adopted as the U.S. standard.
RCA convinced the FCC to approve its color system in December 1953. NBC was ready with
color programming within days of the Commission’s decision. NBC began the transition with a
few shows in 1954, and broadcast its first program to air all episodes in color beginning
that summer, The Marriage. In 1955, NBC broadcast a live production in
color of Peter Pan, a new Broadway musical adaptation of J. M. Barrie’s beloved play,
on the Producers’ Showcase anthology series, The first such telecast of its kind, the broadcast
starred the musical’s entire original cast, led by Mary Martin as Peter and Cyril Ritchard
in a dual role as Mr. Darling and Captain Hook. The broadcast drew the highest ratings
for a television program for that period. It was so successful that NBC restaged it
as a live broadcast a mere ten months later; in 1960, long after Producers’ Showcase had
ended its run, Peter Pan, with most of the 1955 cast, was restaged again, this time as
a standalone special, and was videotaped so that it would no longer have to be performed
live on television. In 1956, NBC started a subsidiary, California
National Productions (CNP), for merchandising, syndication and NBC opera company operations
with the production of Silent Services. By 1957, NBC planned to remove the opera company
from CNP and CNP was in discussion with MGM Television about handling syndication distribution
for MGM series.During a National Association of Broadcasters meeting in Chicago in 1956,
NBC announced that its owned-and-operated station in that market, WNBQ (now WMAQ-TV),
had become the first television station in the country to broadcast its programming in
color (airing at least six hours of color broadcasts each day). In 1959, NBC premiered
a televised version of the radio program The Bell Telephone Hour, which aired in color
from its debut; the program would continue on the NBC television network for nine more
years until it ended in 1968. In 1961, NBC approached Walt Disney about
acquiring the rights to his anthology series, offering to produce the program in color.
Disney was in the midst of negotiating a new contract to keep the program (then known as
Walt Disney Presents) on ABC, however ABC president Leonard Goldenson said that it could
not counter the offer, as the network did not have the technical and financial resources
to carry the program in color. Disney subsequently struck a deal with NBC, which began airing
the anthology series in the format in September 1961 (as Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of
Color). As many of the Disney programs that aired in black-and-white on ABC were actually
filmed in color, they could easily be re-aired in the format on the NBC broadcasts. In January
1962, NBC’s telecast of the Rose Bowl became the first college football game ever to be
telecast in color. By 1963, much of NBC’s prime time schedule
was presented in color, although some popular series (such as The Man from U.N.C.L.E., which
premiered in late 1964) were broadcast in black-and-white for their entire first season.
In the fall of 1965, NBC was broadcasting 95% of its prime time schedule in color (with
the exceptions of I Dream of Jeannie and Convoy), and began billing itself as “The Full Color
Network.” Without television sets to sell, rival networks followed more slowly, finally
committing to an all-color lineup in prime time in the 1966–67 season. Days of Our
Lives became the first soap opera to premiere in color, when it debuted in November 1965.
NBC contracted with Universal Studios in 1964 to produce the first feature-length film produced
for television, See How They Run, which first aired on October 17, 1964; its second television
movie, The Hanged Man, aired six weeks later on November 28. Even while the presentations
performed well in the ratings, NBC did not broadcast another made-for-TV film for two
years.In 1967, NBC reached a deal with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) to acquire the broadcast rights to the
classic 1939 film The Wizard of Oz. CBS, which had televised the film annually since 1956,
refused to meet MGM’s increased fee to renew its television rights. Oz had been, up to
then, one of the few programs that CBS had telecast in color. However, by 1967, color
broadcasts had become standard on television, and the film simply became another title in
the list of specials that NBC telecast in the format. The film’s showings on NBC were
distinctive as it televised The Wizard of Oz without a hosted introduction, as CBS had
long done; it was also slightly edited for time in order to make room to air more commercials.
Despite the cuts, however, it continued to score excellent television ratings in those
pre-VCR days, as audiences were generally unable to see the film any other way at that
time. NBC aired The Wizard of Oz each year from 1968 to 1976, when CBS, realizing that
they may have committed a colossal blunder by letting a huge ratings success like Oz
go to another network, agreed to pay MGM more money to re-acquire the rights to show the
film. The late 1960s brought big changes in the
programming practices of the major television networks. As baby boomers reached adulthood,
NBC, CBS and ABC began to realize that much of their existing programming had not only
been running for years, but had audiences that skewed older. In order to attract the
large youth population that was highly attractive to advertisers, the networks moved to clean
house of a number of veteran shows. In NBC’s case, this included programs like The Bell
Telephone Hour and Sing Along With Mitch, which both had an average viewer age of 50.
During this period, the networks came to define adults between the ages of 18 and 49 as their
main target audience, although depending on the show, this could be subdivided into other
age demos: 35–45, 18–25 or 18–35. Regardless of the exact target demographic, the general
idea was to appeal to viewers who were not close to retirement age and to modernize television
programming, which the networks felt overall was stuck in a 1950s mentality, to closely
resemble contemporary American society.====1970s doldrums====
The 1970s started strongly for NBC thanks to hits like Adam-12, Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,
Ironside, The Dean Martin Show and The Flip Wilson Show. However, despite the success
of such new shows as the NBC Mystery Movie, Sanford and Son, Chico and the Man, Little
House on the Prairie, The Midnight Special, The Rockford Files, Police Woman and Emergency!,
as well as continued success from veterans like The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
and The Wonderful World of Disney, the network entered a slump in the middle of the decade.
Disney, in particular, saw its ratings nosedive once CBS put 60 Minutes up against the program
in the Sunday 7:00 p.m. time slot in the 1975–76 season.
In 1974, under new president Herb Schlosser, the network tried to attract younger viewers
with a series of costly movies, miniseries and specials. This failed to attract the desirable
18–34 demographic, and simultaneously alienated older viewers. None of the new prime-time
shows that NBC introduced in the fall of 1975 earned a second season renewal, all failing
in the face of established competition. The network’s lone breakout success that season
was the groundbreaking late-night comedy/variety show, NBC’s Saturday Night – which would
be renamed Saturday Night Live in 1976, after the cancellation of a Howard Cosell-hosted
program of the same title on ABC – which replaced reruns of The Tonight Show that previously
aired in its Saturday time slot. In 1978, Schlosser was promoted to executive
vice president at RCA, and a desperate NBC lured Fred Silverman away from top-rated ABC
to turn its fortunes around. With the notable exceptions of CHiPs, Barbara Mandrell and
the Mandrell Sisters, Diff’rent Strokes and its spin-off The Facts of Life, Real People
and the miniseries Shōgun, Silverman was unable to pull out a hit. Failures accumulated
rapidly under his watch (such as Hello, Larry, Supertrain, Pink Lady and Jeff, The Krofft
Superstar Hour, season six of Saturday Night Live, and The Waverly Wonders). Many of them
were beaten in the ratings by shows that Silverman had greenlit during his previous tenures at
CBS and ABC. During this time, several longtime affiliates
also defected from NBC in markets such as Atlanta (WSB-TV), Baltimore (WBAL-TV), Baton
Rouge (WBRZ-TV), Charlotte (WSOC-TV), Dayton (WDTN), Indianapolis (WRTV), Jacksonville
(WTLV), Minneapolis-St. Paul (KSTP-TV), San Diego (KGTV), Schenectady (WRGB) and Wheeling
(WTRF-TV). Most were wooed away by ABC, which had lifted out of last place to become the
#1 network during the late 1970s and early 1980s, while WBAL-TV, WRGB and WTRF-TV went
to CBS; WBAL-TV was originally to go to ABC, but the station decided against it because
ABC’s evening newscasts had attracted ratings too dismal for them to consider doing so.
In the case of WSB-TV and WSOC-TV, which have both since become ABC affiliates, both stations
were (and remain) under common ownership with Cox Enterprises, with its other NBC affiliate
at the time, WIIC-TV in Pittsburgh (which would become WPXI in 1981 and also remains
owned by Cox), only staying with the network because WIIC-TV itself was a distant third
to CBS-affiliated powerhouse KDKA-TV and ABC affiliate WTAE-TV (KDKA-TV, owned at the time
by Group W and now owned by CBS, infamously passed up affiliating with NBC after Westinghouse
bought the station from DuMont in 1954, leading to an acrimonious relationship between NBC
and Westinghouse that lasted for years afterward). In markets such as San Diego, Charlotte and
Jacksonville, NBC had little choice but to affiliate with a UHF station, with the San
Diego station (KNSD) eventually becoming an NBC O&O. In Wheeling, NBC ultimately upgraded
its affiliation when it partnered with WTOV-TV in nearby Steubenville, Ohio, overtaking former
affiliate WTRF-TV in the ratings by a large margin. Other smaller television markets like
Yuma, Arizona waited many years to get another local NBC affiliate (first with KIVA, and
later KYMA). The stations in Baltimore, Dayton and Jacksonville, however, have since rejoined
the network. After President Jimmy Carter pulled the U.S.
team out of the 1980 Summer Olympics, NBC canceled a planned 150 hours of coverage (which
had cost $87 million for the broadcast rights), placing the network’s future in doubt. It
had been counting on the broadcasts to help promote its new fall shows, and had been estimated
to pull in $170 million in advertising revenue.The press was merciless towards Silverman, but
the two most savage attacks on his leadership came from within the network. The company
that composed the promotional theme for NBC’s “Proud as a Peacock” image campaign created
a parody song called “Loud as a Peacock,” which was broadcast on Don Imus’ program on
WNBC radio in New York. Its lyrics blamed Silverman for the network’s problems (“The
Peacock’s dead, so thank you, Fred”). An angered Silverman ordered all remaining copies of
the spoof destroyed, although some copies remain in circulation. Saturday Night Live
writer and occasional performer Al Franken satirized Silverman in a sketch on the program
titled “A Limo For A Lame-O”, where he presented a chart with the top-10 rated programs for
that season and commented that there was “not one N” on the list. Silverman later admitted
he “never liked Al Franken to begin with”, and the sketch ruined Franken’s chance of
succeeding Lorne Michaels as executive producer of SNL following his 1980 departure (with
the position going to Jean Doumanian, who was fired after one season following declining
ratings and negative critical reviews. Michaels would later return to the show in 1985).====Tartikoff’s turnaround====
Fred Silverman resigned as entertainment president in the summer of 1981. Grant Tinker, a highly
regarded producer who co-founded MTM Enterprises with then-wife Mary Tyler Moore, became president
of the network and Brandon Tartikoff became president of the entertainment division. Tartikoff
inherited a schedule full of aging dramas and very few sitcoms, but showed patience
with promising programs. One such show was the critically acclaimed Hill Street Blues,
which suffered from poor ratings during its first season. Rather than canceling the show,
he moved the Emmy Award-winning police drama from Steven Bochco to Thursdays, where its
ratings improved dramatically. He used the same tactics with St. Elsewhere and Cheers.
Shows like these were able to get the same ad revenue as their higher-rated competition
because of their desirable demographics, upscale adults ages 18–34. While the network claimed
moderate successes with Gimme a Break!, Silver Spoons, Knight Rider and Remington Steele,
its biggest hit during this period was The A-Team, which, at 10th place, was the network’s
only program to rank in the Nielsen Top-20 for the 1982–83 season, and ascended to
fourth place the following year. These shows helped NBC through the disastrous 1983–84
season, which saw none of its nine new fall shows gaining a second year.In February 1982,
NBC canceled Tom Snyder’s The Tomorrow Show and gave the 12:35 a.m. time slot to 34-year-old
comedian David Letterman. Though Letterman was unsuccessful with his weekday morning
talk show effort for the network (which debuted on June 23, 1980), Late Night with David Letterman
proved much more successful, lasting for 11 years and serving as the launching pad for
another late-night talk franchise that continues to this day.
In 1984, the huge success of The Cosby Show led to a renewed interest in sitcoms, while
Family Ties and Cheers, both of which premiered in 1982 to mediocre ratings (the latter ranking
at near dead last among all network shows during the 1982–83 season), saw their viewership
increase from having Cosby as a lead-in. The network rose from third place to second in
the ratings during the 1984–85 season and reached first place in 1985–86, with hits
The Golden Girls, Miami Vice, 227, Night Court, Highway to Heaven and Hunter. The network’s
upswing continued late into the decade with ALF, Amen, Matlock, L.A. Law, The Hogan Family,
A Different World, Empty Nest, Unsolved Mysteries and In the Heat of the Night. In 1986, Bob
Wright was appointed as chairman of NBC. In the fall of 1987, NBC conceived a syndication
package for its owned-and-operated stations, under the brand “Prime Time Begins at 7:30”,
consisting of five sitcoms that each aired once a week, and were produced by various
production companies contracted by NBC. The series included Marblehead Manor (from Paramount
Television, airing Mondays), centering on a mansion owner and the people who live with
him; She’s the Sheriff (from Lorimar-Telepictures and airing Tuesdays), a comeback vehicle for
Suzanne Somers which cast her as a widowed county sheriff; a series adapted from the
George S. Kaufman play You Can’t Take It with You (airing Wednesdays), starring Harry Morgan;
Out of This World (from MCA Television and airing Thursdays), which starred Maureen Flannigan
as a teenager born to an alien father and human mother that develops supernatural abilities
on her 15th birthday; and a revival of the short-lived 1983 NBC series We Got It Made
(produced by Fred Silverman for MGM Television and closing out the week on Fridays), as part
of an ongoing trend at the time in which former network series were revived in first-run syndication.The
package was aimed at attracting viewers to NBC stations in the half-hour preceding prime
time (8:00 p.m. in the Eastern and Pacific Time Zone, 7:00 p.m. elsewhere), and was conceived
as a result of the FCC’s loosening of the Prime Time Access Rule, legislation passed
in 1971 that required networks to turn over the 7:30 p.m. (Eastern) time slot to local
stations to program local or syndicated content; and the relaxation of the Financial Interest
and Syndication Rules, which had prevented networks from producing content from their
own syndication units to fill the void. The shows that were part of the package were regularly
outrated in many markets by such syndicated game shows as Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!
and Hollywood Squares. Marblehead Manor, We Got It Made and You Can’t Take It With You
were cancelled at the end of the 1987–88 season, with She’s the Sheriff lasting one
more season in weekend syndication before its cancellation. Out of This World ran for
three additional seasons, airing mainly on weekends, and was the most successful of the
five series. NBC aired the first of eight consecutive Summer
Olympic Games broadcasts when it covered the 1988 Games in Seoul, South Korea. The 1988–89
season saw NBC have an astonishing 18 series in Nielsen’s year-end Top 30 most-watched
network programs; it also ranked at first place in the weekly ratings for more than
12 months, an unprecedented achievement that has not been duplicated since. The network
continued its hot streak into the early 1990s with new hits such as The Fresh Prince of
Bel-Air, Blossom and Law & Order.====”Must See TV”====In 1991, Tartikoff left his role as NBC’s
President of Entertainment to take an executive position at Paramount Pictures. In the course
of a decade, he had taken control of a network with no shows in the Nielsen Top 10 and left
it with five. Tartikoff was succeeded by Warren Littlefield, whose first years as entertainment
president proved shaky as a result of most of the Tartikoff-era hits ending their runs.
Some blamed Littlefield for losing David Letterman to CBS after naming Jay Leno as the successor
to Johnny Carson on The Tonight Show, following the latter’s retirement as host in May 1992.
Things turned around with the launches of new hit series such as Mad About You, Wings,
Sisters, Frasier, Friends, ER and Will & Grace. One of Tartikoff’s late acquisitions, Seinfeld
initially struggled from its debut in 1989 as a summer series, but grew to become one
of NBC’s top-rated shows after it was moved to Thursdays in the time slot following Cheers.
Seinfeld ended its run in 1998, becoming the latest overall television program in the U.S.
to end its final season as the leader in the Nielsen ratings for a single television season.
Consequently, Friends emerged as NBC’s biggest television show after the 1998 Seinfeld final
broadcast. It dominated the ratings, never leaving the top five watched shows of the
year from its second through tenth seasons and landing on the number-one spot during
season eight in the 2001–02 season as the latest sitcom in the U.S. to lead the annual
Nielsen primetime television ratings. Cheers spinoff Frasier became a critical and commercial
success, usually landing in the Nielsen Top 20 – although its ratings were overshadowed
to a minor extent by Friends – and went on to win numerous Emmy Awards (eventually
setting a record for a sitcom that lasted until it was overtaken by Modern Family in
2014). In 1994, the network began branding its strong Thursday night lineup, mainly in
reference to the comedies airing in the first two hours, under the “Must See TV” tagline
(which during the mid- and late 1990s, was also applied to NBC’s comedy blocks on other
nights, particularly on Tuesdays). By the mid-1990s, NBC’s sports division, headed
by Dick Ebersol, had rights to three of the four major professional sports leagues (the
NFL, Major League Baseball and the NBA), the Olympics, and the national powerhouse Notre
Dame Fighting Irish football team. The NBA on NBC enjoyed great success in the 1990s
due in large part to the Chicago Bulls’ run of six championships at the hands of superstar
Michael Jordan. However, NBC Sports would suffer a major blow in 1998, when it lost
the rights to the American Football Conference (AFC) to CBS, which itself had lost rights
to the National Football Conference (NFC) to Fox four years earlier; the deal stripped
NBC of National Football League (NFL) game telecasts after 59 years and AFC games after
36 years (dating back to its existence as the American Football League prior to its
1970 merger with the NFL). Littlefield left NBC in 1998 to pursue a career
as a television and film producer, with the network subsequently going through three entertainment
presidents in three years. Littlefield was replaced as president of NBC Entertainment
by Scott Sassa, who oversaw the development of such shows as The West Wing, Law & Order:
Special Victims Unit and Fear Factor. After Sassa was reassigned to NBC’s West Coast Division,
Garth Ancier was named as his replacement in 1999. Jeff Zucker then succeeded Ancier
as president of NBC Entertainment in 2000.====New century, new problems====
At the start of the 2000s, NBC’s fortunes started to take a rapid turn for the worse.
That year, NBC’s longstanding ratings lead ended as CBS (which had languished in the
ratings after losing the NFL) overtook it for first place. In 2001, CBS chose to move
its hit reality series Survivor to serve as the anchor of its Thursday night lineup. Its
success was taken as a suggestion that NBC’s nearly two decades of dominance on Thursday
nights could be broken; even so, the strength of Friends, Will & Grace, ER and Just Shoot
Me! (the latter of which saw its highest viewership following its move to that night in the 2000–01
season) helped the network continue to lead the Thursday ratings. Overall, NBC retook
its first place lead that year, and spent much of the next four years (with the exception
of the 2002–03 season, when it was briefly jumped again by CBS for first) in the top
spot. On the other hand, NBC was stripped of the
broadcast rights to two other major sports leagues: it lost Major League Baseball to
Fox after the 2000 season (by that point, NBC only had alternating rights to the All-Star
Game, League Championship Series and World Series), and, later, the NBA to ABC after
the 2001–02 season. After losing the NBA rights, NBC’s major sports offerings were
reduced to the Olympics (which in 2002, expanded to include rights to the Winter Olympics,
as part of a contract that gave it the U.S. television rights to both the Summer and Winter
Olympics through 2012), PGA Tour golf events and a floundering Notre Dame football program
(however, it would eventually acquire the rights to the National Hockey League in May
2004). In October 2001, NBC acquired Spanish-language
network Telemundo from Liberty Media and Sony Pictures Entertainment for $2.7 billion, beating
out other bidders including CBS/Viacom. The deal was finalized in 2002.In 2003, French
entertainment conglomerate Vivendi Universal sold 80% of its film and television subsidiary,
Vivendi Universal Entertainment, to NBC’s parent company, General Electric, integrating
the network with Vivendi Universal’s various properties (Universal Pictures film studio,
Canal+ television networks, & Universal Parks & Resorts theme & amusement parks & resorts)
upon completion of the merger of the two companies under the combined NBC Universal brand. NBC
Universal was then owned 80% by General Electric and 20% by Vivendi. In 2004, Zucker was promoted
to the newly created position of president of NBC Universal Television Group. Kevin Reilly
became the new president of NBC Entertainment.In 2004, NBC experienced a Three on a match scenario
(Friends and Frasier ended their runs; Jerry Orbach, who had played one of the most popular
characters of its hit Law & Order, died suddenly later that year), and shortly afterward was
left with several moderately rated shows and few true hits. In particular, Friends spin-off
Joey, despite a relatively strong start, started to falter in the ratings during its second
season. The 2004–05 season saw NBC become the first major network to air select dramas
in letterbox over its analog broadcast feed; the move was done in the hopes of attracting
new viewers, although the network saw only a slight boost.
In December 2005, NBC began its first week-long primetime game show event, Deal or No Deal;
the series garnered high ratings, and returning as a weekly series in March 2006. Otherwise,
the 2005–06 season was one of the worst for NBC in three decades, with only one fall
series, the sitcom My Name Is Earl, surviving for a second season; the sole remaining anchor
of the “Must See TV” lineup, Will & Grace also saw its ratings decline. That season,
NBC’s ratings freefalled to fourth place, behind a resurgent ABC, Fox (which would eventually
become the most-watched U.S. broadcast network in the 2007–08 season) and top-rated CBS
(which led for much of the remainder of the decade). During this time, all of the networks
faced audience erosion from increased competition by cable television, home video, video games
and the Internet, with NBC being the hardest hit.
The 2006–07 season was a mixed bag for the network, with Deal or No Deal remaining strong
and Heroes becoming a surprise hit on Monday nights, while the highly touted Studio 60
on the Sunset Strip (from West Wing creator Aaron Sorkin) lost a third of its premiere-night
viewers by Week 6 and was eventually cancelled; two critically acclaimed sitcoms, The Office
and 30 Rock, also pulled in modest successes and went on to win the Emmy Award for Outstanding
Comedy Series for four consecutive years. The network also regained the rights to the
NFL after eight years that season when it acquired the Sunday Night Football package
from ESPN (as part of a deal that also saw Monday Night Football move to ESPN from ABC).
However, despite this, NBC remained at a very distant fourth place, barely ranking ahead
of The CW. However, NBC did experience success with its
summer schedule, despite its declining ratings during the main broadcast season. America’s
Got Talent, a reality talent competition series that premiered in 2006, earned a 4.6 rating
in the 18-49 demographic, higher than that earned by the 2002 premiere of Fox’s American
Idol. Got Talent (which is the flagship of an international talent competition franchise)
would continue to garner unusually high ratings throughout its summer run. However, NBC decided
not to place it in the spring season, and instead use it as a platform to promote their
upcoming fall shows. Originally hosted by Regis Philbin, as of 2018 the series is currently
hosted by Tyra Banks, and continues to garner strong ratings throughout its summer seasons.
In March 2007, NBC announced that it would begin offering full-length episodes of its
prime time series for streaming on mobile devices, becoming the first U.S. broadcast
network to offer on-demand mobile episode content, as the market began shifting away
from traditional television.Following the unexpected termination of Kevin Reilly, in
2007, Ben Silverman was appointed president of NBC Entertainment, while Jeff Zucker was
promoted to succeed Bob Wright as CEO of NBC. The network failed to generate any new primetime
hits during the 2008–09 season (despite the rare good fortune of having the rights
to both the Super Bowl and the Summer Olympics in which to promote their new programming
slate), the sitcom Parks and Recreation survived for a second season after a six-episode first
season, while Heroes and Deal or No Deal both collapsed in the ratings and were later cancelled
(with a revamped Deal or No Deal being revived for one additional season in syndication).
In a March 2009 interview, Zucker had stated that he no longer believed it would be possible
for NBC to become #1 in prime time. Ben Silverman left the network in 2009, with Jeff Gaspin
replacing him as president of NBC Entertainment.====Comcast era (2011–present)====On December 3, 2009, Comcast announced they
would purchase a 51% controlling stake in NBC Universal from General Electric (which
would retain the remaining 49%) for $6.5 billion in cash and $9.1 billion in raised debt. GE
used $5.8 billion from the deal to buy out Vivendi’s 20% interest in NBC Universal.NBC’s
broadcast of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, in February of that year, generated a ratings
increase of 21% over its broadcast of the 2006 Winter Games in Torino. The network was
criticized for repeatedly showing footage of a crash occurring during practice for an
Olympic luge competition that killed Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili. NBC News president
Steve Capus ordered the footage not to be shown without his permission and Olympics
prime time host Bob Costas promised on-air that the video would not be shown again during
the Games. NBC Universal was on track to lose $250 million in advertising revenue on that
year’s Winter Olympics, failing to make up the $820 million it paid for the U.S. television
rights. Even so, with its continuing position in fourth place (although it virtually tied
with ABC in many demographics on the strength of NBC’s sports broadcasts that year), the
2009–10 season ended with only two scripted shows – Community and Parenthood, as well
as three unscripted shows – The Marriage Ref, Who Do You Think You Are? and Minute
to Win It – being renewed for second seasons, while other series such as Heroes and veteran
crime drama Law & Order (the latter of which ended after 20 seasons, tying it with Gunsmoke
as the longest-running prime time drama in U.S. television history) were cancelled. After Conan O’Brien succeeded Jay Leno as
host of The Tonight Show in 2009, the network gave Leno a new prime time talk show, committing
to air it every weeknight at 10:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific as an inexpensive comedic alternative
to the police procedurals and other hour-long dramas typically aired in that time slot.
In doing so, NBC became the first major U.S. broadcast network in decades, if ever, to
broadcast the same program in a weekdaily prime time strip. Its executives called the
decision “a transformational moment in the history of broadcasting” and “in effect, launching
five shows.” Conversely, industry executives criticized the network for abandoning a history
of airing quality dramas in the 10:00 hour, and expressed concern that it would hurt NBC
by undermining a reputation built on successful scripted series. Citing complaints from many
affiliates, which saw their late-evening newscasts drop significantly in the local ratings during
The Jay Leno Show’s run, NBC announced on January 10, 2010 that it would drop Leno’s
show from the 10:00 p.m. slot – with Zucker announcing plans to shift the program (which
would have been reduced to a half-hour) into the 11:35 p.m. slot and shift its existing
late night lineup (including The Tonight Show) by 30 minutes. The removal of The Jay Leno
Show from its prime time schedule had almost no impact on the network’s ratings. The increases
NBC experienced in the 2010–11 season compared to 2009–10 were almost entirely attributable
to the rising viewership of NBC Sunday Night Football. By 2012, the shows that occupied
the 10:00 p.m. time slot drew lower numbers than The Jay Leno Show did when it aired in
that hour two years before. In the spring of 2010, cable provider and multimedia firm
Comcast announced it would acquire a majority interest in NBC Universal from General Electric,
which would retain a minority stake in the company in the interim.
On September 24, 2010, Jeff Zucker announced that he would step down as NBC Universal’s
CEO once the company’s merger with Comcast was completed at the end of the year. After
the deal was finalized, Steve Burke was named CEO of NBCUniversal and Robert Greenblatt
replaced Jeff Gaspin as chairman of NBC Entertainment. In 2011, NBC was finally able to find a breakout
hit in the midseason reality singing competition series The Voice. Otherwise, NBC had another
tough season, with every single new fall program getting cancelled by season’s end – the third
time this has happened to the network after the fall of 1975, and the fall of 1983 – and
the midseason legal drama Harry’s Law being its only freshman scripted series to be renewed
for the 2011–12 season. The network nearly completed its full conversion to an all-HD
schedule (outside of the Saturday morning time slot leased by the Qubo consortium, which
NBCUniversal would rescind its stake in the following year) on September 20, 2011, when
Last Call with Carson Daly converted to the format with the premiere of its 11th season.
The 2011–12 season was another tough season for NBC. On the upside, the network’s broadcast
of Super Bowl XLVI was the most-watched program in U.S. television history at the time, and
the network’s Monday night midseason lineup of The Voice and musical-drama Smash was very
successful. The network managed to lift itself into third place in the 18-49 demographic
in the 2011–12 season, primarily on the strength of those three programs (SNF, The
Voice, and Smash), breaking the network’s eight-year streak in fourth place. Four shows
survived for a second season, but three of them were cancelled in the following year,
none were unqualified ratings successes, and the network remained a distant fourth place
in total viewership. In the fall of 2012, NBC greatly expanded
its sitcom roster, with eight comedy series airing on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday
nights. NBC bounced back to first place network in adults 18-49 that fall, boosted by the
new season of The Voice, the initial success of freshman drama Revolution and sitcom Go
On, and the continued strength of Sunday Night Football. However, withholding the new season
of The Voice and benching Revolution until late March, the network’s midseason ratings
suffered, falling to fifth place behind Spanish-language network Univision during the February sweeps
period. The 2012–13 season ended with NBC finishing in third place overall, albeit by
a narrow margin, with only three new shows, all dramas, surviving for a second season
(Revolution, Chicago Fire and Hannibal). In 2013, NBC Sports migrated its business
and production operations (including NBCSN) to new facilities in Stamford, Connecticut.
Production of the network’s NFL pre-game show Football Night in America remained at the
NBC Studios at Rockefeller Center (with production operations based in Studio 8G, while the program
itself was broadcast in Studio 8H, the longtime home of Saturday Night Live), until it migrated
to the Stamford facility in September 2014. Despite the failure of another highly advertised
game show event, The Million Second Quiz, the 2013–14 season was mostly successful
for NBC due to the continued success of The Voice, Chicago Fire, Revolution, Sunday Night
Football and Grimm. Along with new hits including The Blacklist, Hannibal and Chicago PD and
a significant ratings boost from its broadcast of the 2014 Winter Olympics, NBC became the
#1 network in the coveted 18-49 demographic that season for the first time since 2003–04,
when Friends ended. NBC also improved considerably in total viewership, finishing behind long-dominant
CBS in second place for the season.The 2014–15 season was something of a mixed bag for NBC,
but still successful. NBC launched eight new series that year, with only one, comedy-drama
police procedural The Mysteries of Laura, being renewed for a second season. Nevertheless,
the network continued to experience success with most of its returning series, especially
The Blacklist (despite a modest decline in viewership following its move to Thursdays
midway through the season, due partly to an initial weak lead-in from miniseries The Slap).
Combined with the record number of viewers tuning in to Super Bowl XLIX, NBC again finished
#1 in the 18-49 demographic and in second place overall.The 2015–16 season was successful
for NBC, with the successful launch of the new drama Blindspot premiering after The Voice,
then subsequently being renewed for a second season in November 2015. NBC also continued
with the success with the Chicago franchise with launching its second spin-off Chicago
Med, which also received an early second season pick up in February 2016. Thursday nights
continues to be a struggle for NBC, with continued success with the third season of The Blacklist
brought the failed launch of Heroes Reborn which was cancelled in January 2016, and thriller
The Player, however NBC found success with police procedural Shades of Blue which improved
the 10pm time slot and was renewed for a second season in February 2016. On the comedy side,
NBC surprisingly found success in the new workplace sitcom Superstore which premiered
as a “preview” after The Voice in November 2015, and officially launched in January 2016
which brought decent ratings for a new comedy without The Voice as a lead-in and which was
subsequently renewed for a second season in February 2016.The 2016–17 season brought
more success for NBC with new Comedy-drama This Is Us which was well received by critics
and ratings and was renewed for two additional seasons in January 2017. The Blacklist continued
to bring in modest ratings however, it brought the failed launch of its spinoff The Blacklist:
Redemption. NBC continued to grow the Chicago franchise with a third spinoff titled Chicago
Justice. On the comedy side, workplace sitcom Superstore continued success in its second
season. The network launched new fantasy sitcom The Good Place following The Voice and brought
in modest ratings and was renewed for a second season in January 2017.==Programming==As of 2013, NBC provides 87 hours of regularly
scheduled network programming each week. The network provides 22 hours of prime time programming
to affiliated stations Monday through Saturdays from 8:00–11:00 p.m. (7:00–10:00 p.m.
in all other U.S. time zones) and Sundays from 7:00–11:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific
Time (6:00–10:00 p.m. in all other time zones).
Daytime programming is also provided weekdays between 12:00 and 3:00 p.m. in the form of
the one-hour weekday soap opera Days of Our Lives (the scheduling of the program varies
depending on the station, although it is initially fed to affiliates at 1:00 p.m. Eastern). NBC
News programming includes the morning news/interview program Today from 7:00–11:00 a.m. weekdays,
7:00–9:00 on Saturdays and 7:00–8:00 on Sundays; nightly editions of NBC Nightly News
(whose weekend editions are occasionally subject to abbreviation or preemption due to sports
telecasts overrunning into the program’s time slot), the Sunday political talk show Meet
the Press, weekday early-morning news program Early Today and newsmagazine Dateline NBC.
Late nights feature the weeknight talk shows The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, Late
Night with Seth Meyers and Last Call with Carson Daly, weeknight replays of the fourth
hour of Today and CNBC program Mad Money, and the sketch comedy show Saturday Night
Live, and the LXTV-produced 1st Look and Open House NYC on Saturdays (replays of the previous
week’s 1st Look also air on Friday late nights on most stations).
The network’s Saturday morning children’s programming time slot is programmed by Litton
Entertainment under a time-lease agreement. The three-hour block of programming designed
for 14-16 year-old teenage viewers is under the umbrella branding of The More You Know,
based on the network’s long-time strand of internally-produced public service announcements
of the same name. It premiered on October 8, 2016, giving Litton control of all but
Fox’s Saturday morning E/I programming among the five major broadcast networks.
Sports programming is also provided weekend afternoons at any time between 12:00 and 6:00
p.m. (9:00 a.m.-3:00 p.m., or tape-delayed in the Pacific Time Zone). Due to the unpredictable
length of sporting events, NBC will occasionally pre-empt scheduled programs (more common with
the weekend editions of NBC Nightly News, and local and syndicated programs carried
by its owned-and-operated stations and affiliates). NBC has also held the American broadcasting
rights to the Summer Olympic Games since the 1988 games and the rights to the Winter Olympic
Games since the 2002 games. Coverage of the Olympics on NBC have included pre-empting
regularly scheduled programs during daytime, primetime, and late night.===NBC News===News coverage has long been an important part
of NBC’s operations and public image, dating to the network’s radio days. Notable NBC News
productions past and present include Today, NBC Nightly News (and its immediate predecessor,
the Huntley-Brinkley Report), Meet the Press (which has the distinction of the longest
continuously running program in the history of American television), Dateline NBC, Early
Today, NBC News at Sunrise, NBC Nightside and Rock Center with Brian Williams.
In 1989, the news division began its expansion to cable with the launch of business news
channel CNBC. The company eventually formed other cable news services including MSNBC
(created in 1996 originally as a joint venture with Microsoft, which now features a mix of
general news and political discussion programs with a liberal stance), and the 2008 acquisition
of The Weather Channel in conjunction with Blackstone Group and Bain Capital. In addition,
NBCSN (operated as part of the NBC Sports Group, and which became an NBC property through
Comcast’s acquisition of NBCUniversal) carries sports news content alongside sports event
telecasts. Key anchors from NBC News are also used during NBC Sports coverage of the Olympic
Games.===Daytime programming===NBC is currently the home to only one daytime
program, the hour-long soap opera Days of Our Lives, which has been broadcast on the
network since 1965. Since NBC turned back an hour of its then two-hour daytime schedule
to its affiliates as a result of the September 2007 expansion of Today to four hours, the
network currently ties with The CW for the fewest daytime programming hours of any major
broadcast television network. Long-running daytime dramas seen on NBC in
the past include The Doctors (1963–1982), Another World (1964–1999), Santa Barbara
(1984–1993), and Passions (1999–2007, later moving to The 101). NBC also aired the
final 4½ years of Search for Tomorrow (1982–1986) after that series was initially cancelled
by CBS, although many NBC affiliates did not clear the show during its tenure on the network.
NBC has also aired numerous short-lived soap operas, including Generations (1989–1991),
Sunset Beach (1997–1999), and the two Another World spin-offs, Somerset (1970–1976) and
Texas (1980–1982). Notable daytime game shows that once aired
on NBC include The Price Is Right (1956–1963), Concentration (1958–1973 and 1987–1991
as Classic Concentration), The Match Game (1962–1969), Let’s Make a Deal (1963–1968
and 1990–1991, as well as a short-lived prime-time revival in 2003), Jeopardy! (1964–1975
and 1978–1979), The Hollywood Squares (1966–1980), Wheel of Fortune (1975–1989 and 1991), Password
Plus/Super Password (1979–1982 and 1984–1989), Sale of the Century (1969–1973 and 1983–1989)
and Scrabble (1984–1990 and 1993). The last game show ever to air as part of NBC’s daytime
schedule was the short-lived Caesars Challenge, which ended in January 1994.
Notable past daytime talk shows that have aired on NBC have included Home (1954–1957),
The Ernie Kovacs Show (1955–1956), The Merv Griffin Show (1962–1963), Leeza (1994–1999)
and Later Today (1999–2000).===Children’s programming===Children’s programming has played a part in
NBC’s programming since its initial roots in television. NBC’s first major children’s
series, Howdy Doody, debuted in 1947 and was one of the era’s first breakthrough television
shows. From the mid-1960s until 1992, the bulk of NBC’s children’s programming was composed
of mainly animated programming including classic Looney Tunes and Woody Woodpecker shorts;
reruns of primetime animated sitcoms such as The Flintstones and The Jetsons; foreign
acquisitions like Astro Boy and Kimba the White Lion; animated adaptions of Punky Brewster,
ALF and Star Trek as well as animated vehicles for Gary Coleman and Mr. T; live-action programs
like The Banana Splits, The Bugaloos and H.R. Pufnstuf; and the original broadcasts of Gumby,
The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, Underdog, The Smurfs, Alvin and the Chipmunks and Disney’s
Adventures of the Gummi Bears. From 1984 to 1989, the network aired a series of public
service announcements called One to Grow On, which aired after the end credits of every
program or every other children’s program.In 1989, NBC premiered Saved by the Bell, a live-action
teen sitcom which originated on The Disney Channel the previous year as Good Morning,
Miss Bliss (which served as a starring vehicle for Hayley Mills; four cast members from that
show were cast in the NBC series as the characters they originally played on Miss Bliss). Saved
by the Bell, despite being given bad reviews from television critics, would become one
of the most popular teen series in television history as well as the top-rated series on
Saturday mornings, dethroning ABC’s The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show in its first season.
The success of Saved by the Bell led NBC to remove animated series from its Saturday morning
lineup in August 1992 in favor of additional live-action series as part of a new block
called TNBC, along with the debut of a Saturday edition of Today. Most of the series featured
on the TNBC lineup were executive produced by Peter Engel (such as City Guys, Hang Time,
California Dreams, One World and the Saved by the Bell spinoff, Saved by the Bell: The
New Class), with the lineup being designed from the start to meet the earliest form of
the FCC’s educational programming guidelines under the Children’s Television Act. NBA Inside
Stuff, an analysis and interview program aimed at teens that was hosted for most of its run
by Ahmad Rashād, was also a part of the TNBC lineup during the NBA season until 2002 (when
the program moved to ABC as a result of that network taking the NBA rights from NBC).
In 2002, NBC entered into an agreement with Discovery Communications to carry educational
children’s programs from the Discovery Kids cable channel. Debuting that September, the
Discovery Kids on NBC block originally consisted exclusively of live-action series, including
reality series Trading Spaces: Boys vs. Girls (a kid-themed version of the TLC series Trading
Spaces); the Emmy-nominated reality game show Endurance, hosted and produced by J. D. Roth
(whose production company, 3-Ball Productions, would also produce reality series The Biggest
Loser for NBC beginning in 2003); and scripted series such as Strange Days at Blake Holsey
High and Scout’s Safari. The block later expanded to include some animated series such as Kenny
the Shark, Tutenstein and Time Warp Trio. In May 2006, NBC announced plans to launch
a new Saturday morning children’s block under the Qubo brand in September 2006. An endeavor
originally operated as a joint venture between NBC Universal, Ion Media Networks, Scholastic
Press, Classic Media and Corus Entertainment’s Nelvana unit (Ion acquired the other partners’
shares in 2013), the Qubo venture also encompassed weekly blocks on Telemundo and Ion Television,
a 24-hour digital multicast network on Ion’s owned-and-operated and affiliated stations,
as well as video on demand services and a branded website. Qubo launched on NBC on September
9, 2006 with six programs (VeggieTales, Dragon, VeggieTales Presents: 3-2-1 Penguins!, Babar,
Jane and the Dragon and Jacob Two-Two). On March 28, 2012, it was announced that NBC
would launch a new Saturday morning preschool block programmed by Sprout (originally jointly
owned by NBCUniversal, PBS, Sesame Workshop and Apax Partners, with the former acquiring
the other’s interests later that year). The block, NBC Kids, premiered on July 7, 2012,
replacing the “Qubo on NBC” block.===Specials===
NBC holds the broadcast rights to several annual specials and award show telecasts including
the Golden Globe Awards and the Emmy Awards (which is rotated across all four major networks
each year). Since 1952, NBC has served as the official U.S. broadcaster of the Macy’s
Thanksgiving Day Parade. CBS also carries unauthorized coverage of the Macy’s parade
as part of The Thanksgiving Day Parade on CBS; However, as NBC holds rights to the parade,
it has exclusivity over the broadcast of Broadway and music performances appearing in the parade
(CBS airs live performances separate from those seen in the parade as a result), and
Macy’s chose to reroute the parade in 2012 out of the view of CBS’ cameras, although
it continues to cover the parade. NBC began airing a same-day rebroadcast of the parade
telecast in 2009 (replacing its annual Thanksgiving afternoon airing of Miracle on 34th Street).
In 2007, NBC acquired the rights to the National Dog Show, which airs following the Macy’s
Thanksgiving Day Parade each year. The network also broadcasts several live-action
and animated specials during the Christmas holiday season, including the 2014 debuts
How Murray Saved Christmas (an animated musical adaptation of the children’s book of the same
name) and Elf: Buddy’s Musical Christmas (a stop-motion animated special based on the
2003 live-action film Elf). Since 2013, the network has aired live musical
adaptations with major stars in lead roles. Originally dismissed as a gimmick, they have
proven to be ratings successes, as well as a nostalgic tribute to the early days of television.
Past adaptations include: The Sound of Music in 2013 (starring Carrie
Underwood as Maria Von Trapp) Peter Pan in 2014 (starring Allison Williams
in the titular role and Christopher Walken as Captain Hook)
The Wiz in 2015 (starring Queen Latifah as the Wiz, Mary J. Blige as the Wicked Witch
and Uzo Aduba as the Good Witch) Hairspray in 2016 (starring Ariana Grande
as Penny Pingleton, Jennifer Hudson as Motormouth Maybelle, Kristin Chenoweth as Velma von Tussle
and Harvey Fierstein as Edna Turnblad, reprising his role in the original Broadway production)
Jesus Christ Superstar in 2018 (starring John Legend as Jesus Christ, Sara Bareilles as
Mary Magdalene and Alice Cooper as King Herod)From 2003 to 2014, NBC also held rights to two
of the three pageants organized by the Miss Universe Organization: the Miss Universe and
Miss USA pageants (NBC also held rights to the Miss Teen USA pageant from 2003, when
NBC also assumed rights to the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants as part of a deal brokered
by Miss Universe Organization owner Donald Trump that gave the network half-ownership
of the pageants, until 2007, when NBC declined to renew its contract to carry Miss Teen USA,
effectively discontinuing televised broadcasts of that event). NBCUniversal relinquished
the rights to Miss Universe and Miss USA on June 29, 2015, as part of its decision to
cut business ties with Donald Trump and the Miss Universe Organization (which was half-owned
by corporate parent NBCUniversal) in response to controversial remarks about Mexican immigrants
made by Trump during the launch of his 2016 campaign for the Republican Presidential nomination.===Programming library===
Through the years, NBC has produced many in-house programs, in addition to airing content from
other producers such as Revue Studios and its successor Universal Television. Notable
in-house productions by NBC have included Get Smart, Bonanza, Little House on the Prairie,
Las Vegas and Crossing Jordan. NBC sold the distribution rights to programs
it produced prior to that year to National Telefilm Associates in 1973; those rights
are currently owned by CBS Television Distribution, although NBC still owns the copyrights to
the episodes. As a result, NBC, in a way, now owns several other series aired on the
network prior to 1973, such as Wagon Train. NBC continues to own its entire library of
programs produced after 1973, through corporate sister NBCUniversal Television Group (the
successor to Universal Television).==Stations==As of June 2018, NBC has eleven owned-and-operated
stations and current and pending affiliation agreements with 226 additional television
stations encompassing 49 states, the District of Columbia, six U.S. possessions and two
non-U.S. territories (Aruba and Bermuda). The network has a national reach of 90.05%
of all households in the United States (or 281,372,474 Americans with at least one television
set). Currently, New Jersey is the only U.S. state
where NBC does not have a locally licensed affiliate. New Jersey is served by New York
City O&O WNBC-TV and Philadelphia O&O WCAU; New Jersey formerly had an in-state affiliate
in Atlantic City-based WMGM-TV, which was affiliated with the network from 1955 to 2014.
NBC maintains affiliations with low-power stations (broadcasting either in analog or
digital) in a few smaller markets, such as Binghamton, New York (WBGH-CD), Jackson, Tennessee
(WNBJ-LD) and Juneau, Alaska (KATH-LD), that do not have enough full-power stations to
support a standalone affiliate. In some markets, these stations also maintain digital simulcasts
on a subchannel of a co-owned/co-managed full-power television station.
As mentioned with New Hampshire and Boston, NBC operates a low-powered station in Boston,
WBTS-LD, which aims to serve as its station in that market while using a network of additional
full-power stations to cover the market in full (including Merrimack, New Hampshire-licensed
Telemundo station WNEU, which transmits WBTS on a second subchannel. A WBTS translator,
WYCN-CD, is licensed to Nashua, New Hampshire and was purchased by NBC in early 2018 after
the FCC spectrum auction, but transmits a full-power signal under a channel share with
the WGBH Educational Foundation and its secondary Boston station WGBX-TV from Needham, Massachusetts.
Currently outside of the NBC Owned Television Stations-operated O&O group, Tegna Media is
the largest operator of NBC stations in terms of overall market reach, owning or providing
services to 20 NBC affiliates (including those in larger markets such as Denver, St. Louis,
Seattle and Cleveland); Gray Television is the largest operator of NBC stations by numerical
total, owning 23 NBC-affiliated stations.==Related services=====
Video-on-demand services===NBC provides video on demand access for delayed
viewing of the network’s programming through various means, including via its website at
NBC.com, a traditional VOD service called NBC on Demand available on most traditional
cable and IPTV providers, and through content deals with Hulu and Netflix (the latter of
which carries only cataloged episodes of NBC programs, after losing the right to carry
newer episodes of its programs during their current seasons in July 2011). NBCUniversal
is a part-owner of Hulu (as part of a consortium that includes, among other parties, the respective
parent companies of ABC and Fox, The Walt Disney Company and 21st Century Fox), and
has offered full-length episodes of most of NBC’s programming through the streaming service
(which are available for viewing on Hulu’s website and mobile app) since Hulu launched
in private beta testing on October 29, 2007.The most recent episodes of the network’s shows
are usually made available on NBC.com and Hulu the day after their original broadcast.
In addition, NBC.com and certain other partner websites (including Hulu) provide complete
back catalogs of most of its current series as well as a limited selection of episodes
of classic series from the NBCUniversal Television Distribution program library – including
shows not broadcast by NBC during their original runs (including the complete or partial episode
catalogs of shows like 30 Rock, The A-Team, Charles in Charge, Emergency!, Knight Rider
(both the original series and the short-lived 2008 reboot), Kojak, Miami Vice, The Office,
Quantum Leap and Simon & Simon).On February 18, 2015, NBC began providing live programming
streams of local NBC stations in select markets, which are only available to authenticated
subscribers of participating pay television providers. All eleven NBC owned-and-operated
stations owned by NBCUniversal Owned Television Stations’ were the first stations to offer
streams of their programming on NBC’s website and mobile app, with intentions to reach agreements
with other station groups to provide streams of NBC-affiliated stations in other markets.
Due to restrictions imposed by the league, the network’s NFL game telecasts are not permitted
to be streamed on the service.===NBC HD===
NBC’s master feed is transmitted in 1080i high definition, the native resolution format
for NBCUniversal’s television properties. However, 19 of its affiliates transmit the
network’s programming in 720p HD, while four others carry the network feed in 480i standard
definition either due to technical considerations for affiliates of other major networks that
carry NBC programming on a digital subchannel, or because a primary feed NBC affiliate has
not yet upgraded their transmission equipment to allow content to be presented in HD.
WRAL-TV in Raleigh, North Carolina (a station that re-joined NBC in February 2016) is currently
testing the upcoming ATSC 3.0 television standard, which will allow the transmission of 2160p
ultra-high-definition television (UHD), through a secondary experimental station (WRAL-EX);
it has transmitted limited NBC programming in UHD through a secondary subchannel, and
is currently the only station overall which transmits NBC’s schedule in 1080p on its main
subchannel. Meet the Press was the first regular series
on a major television network to produce a high-definition broadcast on February 2, 1997,
which aired in the format over WHD-TV in Washington, D.C., an experimental television station owned
by a consortium of industry groups and stations which launched to allow testing of HD broadcasts
and operated until 2002 (the program itself continued to be transmitted in 480i standard
definition over the NBC network until May 2, 2010, when it became the last NBC News
program to convert to HD). NBC officially began its conversion to high definition with
the launch of its simulcast feed, NBC HD, on April 26, 1999, when The Tonight Show became
the first HD program to air on the NBC network as well as the first regularly scheduled American
network program to be produced and transmitted in high definition. The network gradually
converted much of its existing programming from standard-definition to high definition
beginning with the 2002–03 season, with select shows among that season’s slate of
freshmen scripted series being broadcast in HD from their debuts.The network completed
its conversion to high definition in September 2012, with the launch of NBC Kids, a new Saturday
morning children’s block programmed by new partial sister network PBS Kids Sprout, which
also became the second Saturday morning children’s block with an entirely HD schedule (after
the ABC-syndicated Litton’s Weekend Adventure). All of the network’s programming has been
presented in full HD since then (with the exception of certain holiday specials produced
prior to 2005 – such as its annual broadcast of It’s a Wonderful Life – which continue
to be presented in 4:3 SD, although some have been remastered for HD broadcast).===NBCi===In 1999, NBC launched NBCi (briefly changing
its web address to “www.nbci.com”), a heavily advertised online venture serving as an attempt
to launch an Internet portal and homepage. This move saw NBC partner with XOOM.com (not
to be confused with the current money transfer service), e-mail.com, AllBusiness.com, and
Snap.com (eventually acquiring all four companies outright; Snap should also not be confused
with the current-day parent of Snapchat) to launch a multi-faceted internet portal with
e-mail, webhosting, community, chat and personalization capabilities, and news content. Subsequently,
in April 2000, NBC purchased GlobalBrain, a company specializing in search engines that
learned from searches initiated by its users, for $32 million.
The experiment lasted roughly one season; after its failure, NBCi’s operations were
folded back into NBC. The NBC Television portion of the website reverted to NBC.com. However,
the NBCi website continued in operation as a portal for NBC-branded content (NBCi.com
would be redirected to NBCi.msnbc.com), using a co-branded version of InfoSpace to deliver
minimal portal content. In mid-2007, NBCi.com began to mirror the main NBC.com website;
NBCi.com was eventually redirected to the NBC.com domain in 2010.==Evolution of the NBC logo==NBC has used a number of logos throughout
its history; early logos used by the television and radio networks were similar to the logo
of its then parent company, RCA. Logos used later in NBC’s existence incorporated stylized
peacock designs, including the current version that has been in use since 1986.==International broadcasts=====
Canada===NBC network programs can be received throughout
most of Canada on cable, satellite and IPTV providers through certain U.S.-based affiliates
of the network (such as WBTS-LD/Boston, KING-TV/Seattle, KBJR-TV/Duluth, Minnesota, WGRZ/Buffalo, New
York and WDIV-TV/Detroit). Some programs carried on these stations are subject to simultaneous
substitutions, a practice imposed by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
in which a pay television provider supplants an American station’s signal with a feed from
a Canadian station/network airing a particular program in the same time slot to protect domestic
advertising revenue. Some of these affiliates are also receivable over-the-air in southern
areas of the country located near the Canada–United States border (signal coverage was somewhat
reduced after the digital television transition in 2009 due to the lower radiated power required
to transmit digital signals).===Europe and the Middle East===
NBC no longer exists outside the Americas as a channel in its own right. However, NBC
News and MSNBC programs are broadcast for a few hours a day on OSN News, formerly known
as Orbit News in Africa and the Middle East. Sister network CNBC Europe also broadcasts
occasional breaking news coverage from MSNBC as well as The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy
Fallon. CNBC Europe also broadcast daily airings of NBC Nightly News at 00:30 CET Monday to
Fridays.====NBC Super Channel becomes NBC Europe
====In 1993, then-NBC parent General Electric
acquired Super Channel, relaunching the Pan-European cable network as NBC Super Channel. In 1996,
the channel was renamed NBC Europe, but was, from then on, almost always referred to on-air
as simply “NBC”. Most of NBC Europe’s prime time programming
was produced in Europe due to rights restrictions associated with U.S. primetime shows; the
channel’s weekday late night schedule after 11:00 p.m. Central European Time, however,
featured The Tonight Show, Late Night with Conan O’Brien and Later, which the channel’s
slogan “Where the Stars Come Out at Night” was based around. Many NBC News programs were
broadcast on NBC Europe, including Dateline NBC, Meet the Press and NBC Nightly News,
the latter of which was broadcast simultaneously with the initial U.S. telecast. Today was
also initially aired live in the afternoons, but was later broadcast instead the following
morning on a more than half-day delay. In 1999, NBC Europe ceased broadcasting in
most of Europe outside of Germany; the network was concurrently relaunched as a German-language
technology channel aimed at a younger demographic, with the new series NBC GIGA as its flagship
program. In 2005, the channel was relaunched again as the free-to-air movie channel Das
Vierte which eventually shut down end of 2013 (acquired by Disney which replaced it by a
German version of Disney Channel. GIGA Television was subsequently spun off as a separate digital
channel, available on satellite and cable providers in Germany, Austria and Switzerland
which shut down as a TV-station end of 2009.===Latin America=======
Mexico====NBC programming is available in Mexico through
free-to-air affiliates in markets located within proximity to the Mexico–United States
border (such as KYMA-DT/Yuma, Arizona; KGNS-TV/Laredo, Texas; KTSM/El Paso, Texas; KVEO/Brownsville,
Texas; and KNSD/San Diego), whose signals are readily receivable over-the-air in border
areas of northern Mexico. Some U.S.-based border affiliates are also available on subscription
television providers throughout the country, including in the Mexico City area.====Nicaragua====
In Nicaragua, satellite providers carry either select U.S.-based NBC and Telemundo affiliated
stations or the main network feed from NBCUniversal or Telemundo. The main local affiliate stations
are NBC 6 WTVJ, Telemundo 51 WSCV in Miami. In addition to the NBC programming there is
also available by the NBC sister network Telemundo, a Spanish network based in the United States.====Canal de Noticias====
In 1993, NBC launched a 24-hour Spanish-language news channel serving Latin America (the second
news channel serving that region overall, after Noticias ECO, and the first to broadcast
24 hours a day), Canal de Noticias NBC, which based its news schedule around the “wheel”
format conceived at CNN. The channel, which was headquartered in the offices of the NBC
News Channel affiliate news service in Charlotte, North Carolina, employed over 50 journalists
to produce, write, anchor and provide technical services. Canal de Noticias NBC shut down
in 1999 due to the channel’s inability to generate sustainable advertising revenue.===Caribbean===
In the Caribbean, many subscription providers carry either select U.S.-based NBC affiliated
stations or the main network feed from NBC O&Os WNBC in New York City or WTVJ in Miami.
In addition, the network’s programming has been available in the U.S. Virgin Islands
since 2004 on WVGN-LD in Charlotte Amalie (owned by LKK Group), while Telemundo owned-and-operated
station WKAQ-TV in San Juan, Puerto Rico carries the WNBC feed on a digital subchannel. In
these areas, NBC programs are available in English and in Spanish via second audio program.====Bahamas====
In the Bahamas, NBC programming is available via U.S.-based affiliate stations on domestic
cable providers.====Netherlands Antilles====
In Aruba, NBC maintains an affiliation with Oranjestad station PJA-TV (which brands on-air
as “ATV”).===Puerto Rico===
In Puerto Rico, Telemundo O&O WKAQ-TV carries “NBC Puerto Rico” over their third subchannel,
which is effectively a simulcast of WNBC with some local advertising and station identification.===Bermuda===
Until it ended operations in 2014, NBC’s entire program lineup was carried by VSB-TV, using
the Eastern Time Zone feed, though an hour ahead due to its location in the Atlantic
Time Zone. Bermuda currently receives NBC service from WTVJ Miami via cable.===Pacific=======Guam====
In Guam, the entire NBC programming lineup is carried by Hagåtña affiliate KUAM-TV
(which has been an NBC affiliate since 1956) via the network’s East Coast satellite feed.
Entertainment and news programming is broadcast day and date on a one-day tape delay as Guam
is on the west side of the International Date Line (for example, the network’s Thursday
prime time lineup airs Friday evenings on KUAM, and is advertised by the station as
airing on the latter night in on-air promotions). Live programming, including breaking news
and sporting events, airs as scheduled; because of the time difference with the six U.S. time
zones, live sports coverage often airs on the station early in the morning. KUAM’s programming
is relayed to the Northern Mariana Islands via satellite station WSZE in Saipan.====American Samoa====
In American Samoa, NBC was affiliated with KKHJ-LP in Pago Pago from 2005 to 2012. Cable
television providers on the islands carry the network’s programming via Seattle affiliate
KING-TV.====
Federated States of Micronesia====In the Federated States of Micronesia, NBC
programming is available on domestic cable providers via Honolulu affiliate KHNL.===Asia=======NBC Asia and CNBC Asia====
NBC Asia launched in 1994, distributed to Nepal, Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan,
Thailand, Pakistan and the Philippines. Like NBC Europe, NBC Asia featured most of NBC’s
news programs as well as The Tonight Show, Late Night and Saturday Night Live. Like its
European counterpart, it was not allowed to broadcast American-produced primetime shows
due to existing broadcast agreements with other domestic broadcasters. NBC Asia produced
a regional evening news program that aired each weeknight, and occasionally simulcast
some programs from CNBC Asia and MSNBC. NBC also operated NBC Super Sports, a 24-hour
channel devoted to televising sporting events. In July 1998, NBC Asia was replaced by a regional
version of the National Geographic Channel. As is the case with NBC Europe, CNBC Asia
broadcasts select episodes of The Tonight Show and Late Night as well as Meet the Press
are as part of its weekend schedule, and airs NFL games under the Sunday Night Football
brand.====Regional partners====
Through regional partners, NBC-produced programs are seen in some countries in the continent.
In the Philippines, Jack TV (owned by Solar Entertainment) airs Will & Grace and Saturday
Night Live, while TalkTV airs The Tonight Show and NBC News programs including the weekday
and weekend editions of Today, Early Today, Dateline NBC and NBC Nightly News. Solar TV
formerly broadcast The Jay Leno Show from 2009 to 2010. In Hong Kong, English language
free-to-air channel TVB Pearl (operated by TVB) airs live broadcasts of NBC Nightly News,
as well as other select NBC programs.===Australia===
In Australia, the Seven Network has maintained close ties with NBC and has used a majority
of the U.S. network’s image campaigns and slogans since the 1970s (conversely, in 2009,
NBC and Seven both used the Guy Sebastian single “Like it Like That” in image promos
for their respective summer schedules). The network’s Seven News division has used John
Williams-composed “The Mission” (the proprietary theme music for NBC News’ flagship programs
since 1985) as the theme music for its local and national news programs since the mid-1980s.
Local newscasts were also titled Seven Nightly News from the mid-1980s until c. 2000. NBC
News and Seven News often share news resources, with the former division using Seven’s reporters
for breaking news coverage and select taped story packages relating to Australian stories
and the latter sometimes incorporating NBC News reports into its national bulletins.
Seven also rebroadcasts some of NBC’s news and current affairs programming during the
early morning hours (usually from 3:00 to 5:00 a.m. local time), including the weekday
and weekend editions of Today (which it brands as NBC Today to differentiate it from the
unrelated morning program on the Nine Network), Dateline NBC and Meet the Press.==Criticism and controversies====Presidents of NBC Entertainment====
See also==Lists of NBC television affiliates
List of NBC personalities NBC pages
Olympics on NBC CBS
PBS NFL on NBC